Newcastle Hang Gliding Club

Pete Marheine's perfectly mown strips were the scene of last weekend's attempt by a feral dolly on Alby Daniel's life. On Saturday, we used every strip as the wind direction wandered around and bubbles lifted off randomly in the high pressure – sometimes we used the same strip in opposite directions almost simultaneously. Alby was MC and Pete was ringleader (er – tuggie) and Jamie had the backup trike. Several pilots were being reintroduced to aerotowing after a bit of a break; for some, it was more than a bit. Alby helped set up releases, harnesses, rings and ropes for the rest of us, and always had a weak link at hand, thanks Alby. Pete loves towing and was out there early.

The first few launches had some minor glitches as people remembered how to do it. Rob Larkin (Sting) tried footlaunching, quickly followed by base bar wheel launching, followed by a perfect aerotow and the first soaring flight of the day. Al MacMillan (Sting) also tried aerotow footlaunch for the first time and had no problems after some practice. Dawson (Sting) used the dolly but a rogue bubble just after the tow started had him off tow early and dodging trees to pull up (tailwind) with no grief just short of the creek. Geoff (Sting) had some similarly exciting moments before remembering how to do it blue side up. Early launches found the odd hole in the sky and mostly light broken lift, so the tows tended to be short and the pilots sometimes beat the tug back to the strip.

After getting everyone else off (at least once), Alby took a dolly launch (which he hardly ever does) in his C4. Just after the takeoff roll started, Pete hit some squirrely air, so he aborted the launch shortly after liftoff. Alby had just come out of the dolly and skidded smoothly to a halt on his speed bar (love those short-mown strips), whereupon the dolly rolled into the back of him, putting a three-inch slit in the C4's sail. Anyone know a good sailmaker? Five minutes later, Alby was on his way with a stickyback patch over the ventilation and his opinion of dollies confirmed. I took a second tow as the sky was starting to work well despite being totally blue and apparently stable, and joined him at 6500' (inversion height).

There was no drift and you could fly anywhere – the ridges, headlands and valleys of the Upper Hunter and the wilds of the Wollemi Wilderness and Goulburn River NP looked great. MillMan (Dave Phillips) brought his flying plank up to our level too, causing the usual comments about UFOs. Dawson and the other Sting pilots were now spending more time up than down as the afternoon mellowed into a classic easy cruising day. Donny showed up and joined the rest of us at altitude in his C4 – think he was last down for the day (never happened before), other than Jamie doing circuits and bumps in his beast. Put the wing in Pete's hangar and it's time for a beer, then wander into town for dinner at the pub and for those staying after the hangar party, an all night snoreathon.

Sunday was another day, with an early morning southeast change bringing low cu's drifting fast overhead in streets. Jamie did his BFR (flight check) in trikes, thermalling up under the early black bases, and Donny set up his Fun and footblender for an hour or so's cruising round before the wind mixed down. MillMan and Geoff took tows but had to go back to town and weren't interested in XC; Geoff's was finally perfectly smooth except for getting off low but he hung in there and thermalled up.

Alby was excited – he and I had always wanted to go XC up the valley from Pete's under a good sky and this was it. As preparation, I'd flattened my radio battery the day before and Alby declared his phone to be non-operable. No comms, no maps, that always means a great XC day. Alby found me a Duracell pack for the Icom and we planned a route. We were going to have to jump cloudstreets, as the direction was over Mt. Dangar into Goulburn River NP but there was a street right overhead Pete's to start off with. Pete towed me up first but 200' off the deck I suddenly had the rope as the weaklink let go at the trike end; I aimed the rope at Donny packing up the Fun by the hangar but missed him completely as I returned to the launch point. New weaklink installed and off we go, over the sandstone ridge southeast of Pete's, a slow tow in moderate headwind and very light lift under the street. Pinned off and climbed slowly, waiting for Alby who was (surprise surprise) footlaunching. We reached 3500' and headed crosswind in sink to the street over Sandy Hollow, picking it up about a grand off the deck and back to 3500; base was less than 5K.

Now things looked great but the struggle wasn't over. The wind was picking up more, the street was drying up and finding a good climb was getting tricky. We ran low along the ridge between Giant's Creek and Gungal, Alby just a little higher and sure enough, he hit the next bubble just as I fell off the ridge into the valley with the bag open and the cows welcoming me down, while Alby made banjo noises on the radio. Before I'd put the C4 down in the shade, he was calling 4500' at Merriwa and intending to head for Cassilis at least. The stallion in my paddock started challenging me but took a sniff of my harness and decided he wanted no part of that.

Pete picked me up in the Yellow Submarine and as we headed west in pursuit, we realised Alby's radio battery had gone flat – exactly the reason he had the battery pack he'd lent me. Doesn't help you in the air of course – once you can only transmit clicks, the game is to play 'twenty questions', with one click for yes, two for no. 'Alby, have you landed?' Click. 'Alby have you landed at Cassilis?' Click. 'South side of the highway?' Click. 'Copy that – you have landed on the south side of the highway at Cassilis, see you in ten'. Click. What we didn't know was that his battery was so flat that it would only transmit one click without a pause to recover its minimal charge, and Alby was desperately trying to double-click us. He was at 5500' over Cassilis and although the sky was pretty blue, it was still working and the tailwind was giving 100kmh groundspeed at trim. Pete and I nosed around Cassilis (some great old architecture) looking for a hang glider tumbling end over end across paddocks in a now 20+knot sou-easter but nothing until my phone rang (yes! I had it on, special occasion). Alby had landed 16km short of Dunedoo. Bastard; suppose we'd better pick him up since it's his ca and we're out here anyway.

Alby was grinning ear to ear when we collected him – over 100km distance in not very long at all. He'd just cleared the last ridge before landing but the rotor had got to him and his carbon base bar was the sacrifice. As we headed to Merriwa for beers and a feed, the trees were shaking mightily in the honking sou-easter. Interesting weekend – no injuries or broken metal, only carbon fibre and a sail tear, both on the glider that flew the furthest by far. Hmm, maybe there is justice after all...

Thanks to Pete for towing and retrieving, and having us bunch of disreputable reprobates infesting his strip. And thanks to Alby for making sure everyone was doing it right, and learning from the early excitement; not to mention dragging me around the sky. Stingfest at Denman in three weeks guys!

DD